Grace Campbell’s New Fringe Show on Abortion Feels Like an ‘Exorcism’

Grace Campbell has decided to address her abortion live on stage at the upcoming Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

The 30-year-old comedian has transformed her personal experience of ending a pregnancy into material for her latest show, “Grace Campbell Is on Heat.” The performance will debut this August at the Scottish arts festival, sharing the stage with other comedians like Hannah Gadsby and Sophie Duker.

Campbell underwent an abortion in October of last year and has since described how it led her into a deep depression. In a piece for The Guardian, she expressed feeling unprepared by medical professionals for the physical and mental repercussions that followed.

One critical detail she highlighted was the lack of warning about prolonged bleeding, which lasted more than six weeks. Even while traveling to the U.S. for a series of stand-up shows, she continued to bleed heavily. Through her writing, Campbell aimed to support others enduring similar experiences.

In a recent interview with The Times, Campbell shared her harrowing experience: “I was on my own in New York, wearing a nappy, writing a list in my notepad of all of the places that I’d cried publicly, and it was just everywhere. In every CVS [pharmacy] I would stop and write it down because I had to document how bad it was.”

When discussing “On Heat,” Campbell explained: “I did the only thing I thought might make it better: talk about it on stage. It’s not been this cathartic, therapeutic process because I’m still reeling. But it’s almost like an exorcism.”

The comedian further elaborated: “It is also funny. Abortion is really hard to talk about and very conflicting. People don’t know if they’re allowed to laugh. So what I’m trying to do is show that in the moments I’m letting you laugh, you laugh.”

Despite the challenging subject matter, Campbell aims to present her story in an accessible and non-vulgar manner. She emphasized that “My abortion matured me in a way that I could have never prepared for, and I think the show is a reflection of that.”

She continued, “There are a few bits about sex, but really not in the same way as before. There’s no part of this show that my mum or dad would have to go, like, ‘urgh,’ during… So that’s hopefully a good sign.”

In her earlier writing for The Guardian, Campbell described her unanticipated emotional journey: “The doctor showed me the foetus on the screen, gave me a pill, told me some basic facts, but he didn’t prepare me for what was about to come.

“That I wouldn’t be able to look in the mirror or at pictures of myself for months… That I would feel a pervasive sense of guilt… And that I would then feel shame—shame that feeling guilty was in some way a dishonor to the women who fought for my right to be able to have this choice.”

Source: The Times, The Guardian